Magnetism
by brightspark
Summary: A short arc of five fics for the themes attraction, romance, passion, intimacy and commitment. GippalxBaralai.
1. Unorthodox

It wasn't right, really, Baralai was sure of it. Well, there was nothing expressly _wrong_ with it -- Lord Braska had married an Al Bhed, after all -- but it wasn't quite... orthodox. Once, when he had been praying in the temple, he had heard some priests talking about the new statue of Lord Braska. "A trouble maker," they'd said, "it's a good thing he was a summoner and not a priest. They catch people's fancy for a moment, but then they're dead for the greater good, and people eventually forget." 

Baralai was ambitious. He was calm and kind, polite enough to blind people to his ambition, but one day, he had vowed to be something _good_. He'd never forgotten what the priests had said -- nothing but a few scraps of folklore and a vague gratefulness survived a summoner's sacrifice for long. Somehow, he didn't like the idea of becoming just a handful of statues, a name, and some encouraging tale.

He was sure that, were anyone to discover the feelings growing in him, they would make sure that he would be forgotten entirely.

But there was a certain appeal in Gippal, even if he was an Al Bhed. He was cheerful, expressive -- you always knew where you were with him. Even the eyepatch didn't make him a mystery, and he was willing to explain to anyone willing to listen all about the monster he had fought, the way he had won -- the loss of his eye a minor wound, glossed over. (There was one thing everyone grudgingly admitted about the Al Bhed, if it ever came up -- they had _guts_.)

He was open, in a way that no one else Baralai knew was. And that had a certain magnetism all on its own.

And he was good looking. Baralai admitted that freely, because it felt silly to deny it. Gippal was good looking, and when Baralai dreamed of him he was always embarrassed on waking. He hated feeling so hopelessly attracted to an _Al Bhed_.

Baralai wasn't sure, he'd never felt that way before, but he thought he might even be falling in love with Gippal.


	2. Drawn

Sorry it's been so long since I've updated this! I actually did all the updates on my LiveJournal account, but kept forgetting to do it here. Everything will get uploaded now. :)

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Baralai wasn't sure quite when friendship with Gippal slipped into one attempting to seduce the other. He certainly noticed it more in the later days of the training but never could pinpoint the moment when Gippal had first looked at him with more than friendship, couldn't find a moment in his memory to which he could attach the decision to act on his attraction.

It was when they were bathing together that things really went beyond Baralai's control, though. That frightened him a little at first because he hated things he couldn't control, liked to know exactly what card to play to make things go his way.

Neither of them was _actually_ trying to seduce the other, that day. It just happened that way. They stripped off quickly, hurrying into the water, because the day was warm and the water was cool and lovely on bodies that badly needed the wash. Baralai ducked his head under, slicking back his hair to get it out of the way, surfacing to find Gippal staring at him.

He had to stare back, their gazes meeting as if drawn.

Gippal broke the contact as if embarrassed and quickly dived underwater to get himself fully wet as well. Baralai bit his lip, a little annoyed that the Al Bhed wasn't responding to his attentions as much as he'd liked (forget that he'd been reluctant, himself, to get into a relationship for someone not of his own race and religion).

And after that, they seemed to consciously avoid each other's eyes.

Gippal came up to Baralai, but only later, when they were both dressed and cool and collected, while Baralai sat on watch for the others as a sentry. Gippal couldn't sleep, Baralai could see that in the restless brightness of his eye.

"I'm sorry. About earlier, I mean. I think I made you..."

"Uncomfortable? Sort of."

"I was going to do something, I chickened out," the Al Bhed said, with an air of confessing some guilty little secret.

"What do you mean?"

"I've been trying to get close to you for weeks," Gippal admitted, and though he didn't look a bit ashamed, Baralai felt drawn to him, felt drawn to take Gippal's hand with his own, finding it shaking slightly.

"I know," he said, and wanted to add that he'd been trying to do exactly the same.


	3. Desire

Baralai woke when Gippal cried out in his sleep, and for a moment he just propped himself up, looking down at the Al Bhed. He ran a hand down his cheek, softly, tenderly; moving to unbuckle the eyepatch that Gippal wore even in sleep (though that was, Baralai realised, entirely for his sake -- but he was sure he could handle the sight of a scar). He gently tugged it off, running his hands through Gippal's hair to even it out once the strap was gone.

It didn't look that bad. Certainly, when he propped himself up to look him over properly, it wasn't the scarred over eye he noticed first. It was the muscle beneath skin, the sleeping smile, the spell of contentment he wove over Baralai. The soft pleads in a language he didn't know, slurred with sleep but unmistakeable, pleas that made his fingers itch to touch him, made him ache and burn with desire.

"What are you dreaming?" Baralai asked, softly, leaning down so his words came out in a rush of hot breath against Gippal's ear. He felt the Al Bhed waking, moving a little beneath him, and he moved to grind their hips together, slowly, slowly.

It did occur to him that he, they, would have to be quiet. He moved to put his hand over Gippal's mouth, feeling his breath, his surprise when he woke, his one eye opening slowly, lashes flickering.

"Ssh," he whispered, and that was all, moving to kiss Gippal, kissing, kissing, and Gippal mumbled something again in Al Bhed, clearer at first but then obscured, swallowed up by another kiss. He spoke again, more clearly, pleading.

"E fyhd oui du vilg sa, E fyhd du vilg oui, ohh, Lai, bmayca..."

Baralai didn't _need_ to speak Al Bhed to understand. "I want you inside me."

For a moment it was nothing but kisses, soft and then harder, wanting, needing, and then they were squirming out of their clothes, hot skin against hot skin, hot, hotter --

He arched his back when Gippal slipped a barely slicked finger in him, feeling the burn and sting, reaching to wrap a hand around Gippal's cock, stroking, smooth and quick, as if he'd done it all before. He hadn't. Would never have dared to with any other. But for Gippal --

Two fingers inside him, and he arched more and cried out, softly, licking Gippal's palm teasingly when he reached up, alarmed, to make him hold back the sound. He forced back another cry, rocking back against Gippal's fingers and listening to his soft reassurances, some he could understand, others nonsense and Al Bhed.

And then when he had Gippal's cock pushing into him -- oh, ohh, something so different, something beyond words, and he could only clutch at Gippal and think that if he was betraying his values as a follower of Yevon, at least he was trading them for ecstasy. 


	4. Touched

Baralai wasn't used to being close to people. It wasn't against Yevon's teachings, and companionship was a thing to be desired, enjoyed, companionship like blitz teams and pilgrimages and strong stable marriages --

Not companionship like laying in Gippal's arms, feeling his lips brushing the side of his face, feeling the warmth of Gippal's body (did all Al Bhed have such hot blood?) against his whether there were clothes between them or not.

But he came to include that such companionship was wonderful in its own way.

It was the small intimacies that scared him most. Sex was a big intimacy, and it was fine, and it meant nothing he didn't want it to mean. Kissing, too, kissing and touching, but -- lovemaking, and the look on Gippal's face, and tracing his fingers over Gippal's bared and scarred eye, the sound of Gippal's voice when in the world of sleep he would speak in his own language, those were things that brought them close, so close, maybe too close.

Sometimes Baralai would feel a little flutter in his chest as he watched Gippal's face when they lost themselves in sex, and he could almost swear their souls had touched.

It was an unspoken rule for Baralai. Don't get too close to anyone. You'll lose them to Sin.

But he got too close, he dared the dare.

And he lost Gippal. Not to Sin, this time, but to a betrayal that cut much deeper and threatened to cut them apart altogether, threatened to send them into the cold world of death, apart and alone. And they did separate then, with only a few words, nursing their wounds and the heartache of being betrayed and separated, going to whoever they thought they could trust.

And Baralai mourned the loss of those small intimacies, the things he had come to love about Gippal, the things that had made him fall so utterly, hopelessly in love. 


	5. For Keeps

"I've missed you."

Baralai shivered a little in the cool wind and found himself moving closer to Gippal. He looked up at him, noting the changes, and what hadn't changed. His face was perhaps a little more closed up, his expression less bright, less open.

He still made Baralai's heart leap inside his chest, though.

And Baralai wasn't afraid of that anymore. "I missed you, too," he admitted, looking up into Gippal's one eye for a sight of what he thought of that. He might as well have been looking into a stone.

And then Gippal relaxed a little, his face breaking into a smile, his eyes warming up all of a sudden. "That mean we can be something again? For keeps, this time. I don't do flings any more, and anyway..."

Baralai watched him run out of words, waited a few heartbeats, just to see the vulnerability in Gippal, then nodded slightly. "We can be something again. For keeps, if that's how you want to put it." He took a deep breath, and the words were still hard to say, but he said them anyway, "Yevon doesn't mean anything to me any more. And I don't care what people think of me."

Actually, he did care. But he'd try not to.

"For keeps, then," Gippal said, softly, taking a step closer.

"For keeps," Baralai confirmed, feeling an urge to throw himself at Gippal, into his arms, but checking the impulse. He leaned into Gippal when the Al Bhed's strong arms wrapped around him.

"I love you," Gippal said, quietly, and Baralai leaned against him, pressed closer.

"Love you too," he breathed. 


End file.
